This invention relates generally to synthesized foodstuffs for young mammals and more particularly to milk replacer and dry feed compositions containing high quality inedible egg products as the main ingredient and to the method of producing such milk replacer and dry feed compositions.
It is well known that in the early stages of life for a mammal, mother""s milk is the ideal source of nutrition. Unfortunately for many young mammals, whether by tragedy or by economic necessity, as in the case of animals whose milk is commercially valuable, mother""s milk is not always available. In these instances, the use of a milk replacing composition is required.
There exist many formulations for foodstuffs for neo-natal animals that incorporate dried milk products and vitamin and mineral supplements. The common feature of these prior art compositions is that they derive most of their protein content from a milk source ingredient such as skim milk, buttermilk, whole whey, delactosed whey, casein, milk albumin, and/or whey protein concentrate. Milk source ingredients are used extensively in traditional milk replacers because the existing health data relating to young mammals fed milk replacer diets based on non-milk source ingredients is poor. That is, animals fed with prior art milk replacers having protein sources other than milk proteins are known to suffer from protein deficiencies that can potentially result in debilitating illnesses. This data suggests that only milk-based milk replacers can be used to obtain a healthy young animal.
Conventional milk-based replacers suffer from a number of drawbacks, however. One such drawback relates to the high cost of milk source ingredients. This cost issue presents the conundrum that, while milk replacer compositions are designed to obviate the need for milk in those cases when the mother""s milk is commercially important, the milk replacer composition still must use some amount of milk products in order to keep a young animal healthy.
Additionally, previous milk replacer composition formulas are not designed with the transition from milk to solid food in mind. This fact makes it difficult to wean animals fed with these prior art compositions from the liquid diet. If the young animal will not eat solid food right away, the costs of raising the animal increase significantly. This is because prior art milk replacers are more expensive than xe2x80x9cadultxe2x80x9d diets and must be hand fed. The most glaring drawback of prior art milk replacers, however, is that they are not nutritionally equivalent to, much less superior to, the mother""s milk, so young animals fed these diets frequently fail to thrive and are left susceptible to disease.
In the case of piglets, economic factors encourage farmers to wean baby pigs from the sows as early after birth as possible, which in many cases means as early as ten days after birth. The physiological changes occurring in such young animals make it extremely important for the producer to control disease and provide correct nutrition to ensure a healthy piglet. The same economic factors driving early weaning drive the producer""s need to put weight on the pigs as rapidly as possible without sacrificing the health of the animal. Piglets are highly sensitive to stress and shock, and many animals fed traditional diets fail to thrive when transferred from the farrowing house to the weaning and growing area.
This failure to thrive is an acute and persistent problem and manifests itself most frequently in the form of diarrhea and weight loss. Very young piglets are unable to maintain a low stomach pH, which fact hampers their ability to fully digest their feed and to kill undesirable bacteria that enter their intestines. The undigested food enters the large intestine, where the undesirable bacteria feed on it and cause diarrhea. The sick piglets have little desire to eat, and they can quickly decline to below their birth weight if they are not permitted access to antibody-containing mother""s milk. The health and weight of the sow, however, can be threatened if she is made to suckle the piglets for too long.
In the case of dairy calves, the susceptibility to disease is an acute and persistent problem and manifests itself most frequently in the form of a disease known as xe2x80x9cscoursxe2x80x9d or diarrhea. Calf scours causes more financial loss to herdsmen than any other disease-related problem they encounter. Because the problem of scours is so prevalent, many attempts have been made to formulate a feed supplement that minimizes the incidence of scours. These previous efforts include, among others, the addition of pregelatinized starch, optimizing the ratio of casein to whey proteins, forming soluble gels of dairy by-products, and using treated legumes to form protein and starch digestion products from which a feed may be manufactured.
These latter formulations provide some relief from the scours problem, but do not eliminate it, nor do they work particularly well to put weight on the young animal. As well, once a calf on a prior art diet gets scours, the farmer will have to administer expensive antibiotics and/or feed supplements that may or may not save the animal""s life. This is because most, if not all, prior art milk replacer compositions cannot be fed to an animal with scours because they are so nutritionally deficient that they would only increase the animal""s problem. These prior art compositions therefore leave significant room for improvement.
Some prior art milk replacer compositions have attempted to use eggs and/or modified egg products as the protein component. Because these prior art compositions employ a low quality and/or chemically modified egg fraction, however, these compositions are not able to equal or outperform milk protein-based compositions in terms of young animal weight gain and overall health of the young animal. Examples of these compositions can be found in U.S. Pat. No. 4,009,268 to Cardon et al., U.S. Pat. No. 5,085,874 to Jungvid, U.S. Pat. Nos. 5,643,622 and 5,656,309 to Sawhill, and European Patent No. 426,211 to Carrell et al.
This prior art leaves room for improvement in terms of composition, manufacturing method, and feeding method. The present invention is addressed to such improvement.
The present invention relates to food compositions for young mammals that consist essentially of a high quality inedible egg product or products in an amount from about 1% to 100% by weight and comprise at least one ingredient selected from the group consisting of milk products, cereal grain or cereal grain products, fruit pectin, other carbohydrates, fiber, fat, urea, electrolytes, vitamins, minerals, yeast, and other animal or vegetable protein sources as the balance of the composition. The food composition may be dry or liquid and may be pelletized or unpelletized. If the food composition is liquid, or if it is dry and made liquid by the addition of water or other ingredients, then it may be used as a milk replacer. If the food composition is not liquid or not made so by the addition of liquid ingredients, it may be used as a first solid food for a young mammal. One method of feeding the instant food compositions comprises feeding the milk replacer composition first, then transitioning the young mammal to the first solid food composition.
The provision of high quality inedible egg in the combinations of the present invention imparts desirable antimicrobial activity and a desirable amino acid profile to the foodstuffs. These food compositions allow a young mammal to enjoy levels of health and growth at least equivalent to those that it would enjoy if it were raised on its mother""s milk. Also, by providing a first solid food composition that is similar in formulation to the milk replacer on which an animal is raised, animals may be weaned more quickly from the liquid diet and substantial labor savings in terms of food preparation and hand feeding may be enjoyed thereby. Further, the provision of high quality inedible egg in the combinations of the present invention provides a milk replacer with significant cost advantages over other milk replacer formulations.
These and other objects, advantages, and features are accomplished according to the compositions and methods of the following description of the preferred embodiments of the present invention.